


oh, for you (i'd lose it all)

by mondeblue



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Alternate Universe, Angst, Fluff, Friends to Lovers, Getting Together, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Poor Life Choices, Supernatural Elements, like seriously kageyama just keeps making mistakes, poor blueberry
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-15
Updated: 2017-07-15
Packaged: 2018-12-02 16:34:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 16,712
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11513223
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mondeblue/pseuds/mondeblue
Summary: “If you were to have a lot of time or a lot of money, which would you choose?”In which Kageyama thinks he’s made the right choice, until he meets Hinata.





	oh, for you (i'd lose it all)

**Author's Note:**

> The tags are VV misleading; please don't think this is some really cool well-thought-out tragic death story. It's just two stupid boys being gay. Like, intensely gay. Aggressively gay. Yes, there's angst, but I don't like hurting my volleyboys so it doesn't last very long. Or at all, really.

“If you were to have a lot of time or a lot of money, which would you choose?”

            He stares at the inky darkness in disbelief. This is a dream, this must be a dream – he can’t remember how he got here, and when he looks down his hands look warped and just slightly off-kilter. He hears, distantly, something about _if you choose one you’ll lack the other_ , but he's too busy trying to wrap his head around this too-good-to-be-true offer.

(He hears _if you choose one you'll lack the other_ , thinks about his mother’s frail wrist and his father’s tired eyes, and doesn’t care.)

            “Money,” he says, interrupting the voice coming from – everywhere and nowhere, it seems. “I want money.”

            “Are you sure?” It sounds like a warning. “There’s a catch.”

            Generally speaking, he doesn’t usually express amusement. Sure, he _feels_ it, whenever he watches funny cat videos or finds a really good meme, but he doesn’t show it. One time he tried to smile, and everyone promptly ran for the hills.

            But when the catch turns out to be, “If you fall in love, your decision will be reversed,” he has to hold back a terrifyingly snort-like sound.

            “I don’t care,” he says defiantly, ignoring how stupid he feels talking to literally nothing. “Nothing will make me want to change my decision.”

            There’s a strange silence afterwards, a brief, pregnant pause, before whomever it is who’s talking sighs. “What makes you so confident, Kageyama Tobio?”

            He stares ahead. “Conviction.”

            He will never, ever fall in love.

\--

He wakes up feeling like he’s been crying all night.

He stares up at the sunlight cutting clear across his bedroom ceiling; budget cuts had taken away his right to curtains. He’s gripping his threadbare quilt so hard his knuckles are white, he realizes, and promptly lets go.

It’s his first day of high school.

 _Maybe I’ll actually make some friends this year_ , he thinks to himself as he performs his morning stretches, working out the ache in his joints. Not like it was his fault he didn’t approach anyone in junior high; he’d made it into one of the most prestigious schools in Miyagi, and his classmates were divided cleanly between smartass nerds he hated and pretentious rich kids he hated more. Besides, he was too busy working himself to death anyway.

The house is quiet as he washes up and makes breakfast, both his parents having left hours ago. The painful wrench in his gut as he opens the fridge door and sees the emptiness like a screaming sign of their poverty is a familiar feeling, and he ignores it as he makes himself a sandwich for lunch and stuffs half a slice of bread into his mouth for breakfast, washing it down with milk. He’ll go hungry again today.

He can’t remember the dream he had last night, which is strange, and he ponders over this as he’s tying his shoes. He remembers something about a choice, stifling a laugh, but the chase for any other information returns no results.

 _It’s not a big deal,_ he tries to console himself, but he can’t shake the feeling of missing something important as he steps out of the doorway.

\--

The first half of his first day at school is taken up by the welcome assembly, and as he scans the faces of the people around him he realizes, abruptly, that this is a completely different environment than the one he spent the past three years getting used to. Although he’d been able to get into his middle school on an academic scholarship, high school is different. Kageyama had only to glance at the tuition fees on the sheet he’d been given to decide he would be abandoning the elite route and going back to mainstream. And mainstream this school is indeed, if the looks of boredom and relatively middle-class wealth around him are any indication. He suppresses a smile. Maybe making friends won’t be so hard after all.

But when lunchtime rolls around and he finds himself sitting dejectedly under the awning of the connecting pathway between the school and gym, all hopes of that go promptly in the trash. He’s about to sulk when he sees the disc flying right at him, and taking a Frisbee travelling at the speed of sound to the forehead kind of ruins any hope of looking like the classic emo teenager.

“Hinata, stop throwing it so far.”

“Sorry, sorry!” And then there’s a ball of bright orange hair running straight for him, and maybe he’s more scared for his life in this situation that he was getting hit with the Frisbee, because _how fast can this guy run?_ “Are you okay? Does it hurt? Kenma says I throw it far but I don’t, really, he just never has energy for anything except video games and Kuroo.” The stranger skids to a stop. His talking is the fastest of the three high-velocity objects Kageyama has witnessed in the past three seconds, and he’s getting more and more annoyed by the second.

“It’s fine,” he says, and turns to the side because it’s not, really, it actually kind of hurts and Kageyama was looking forward to lunch after hours of standing in the gym. “I barely felt anything.”

He’d meant it as both a conversation closer and consolation, but it does the exact opposite of both as the stranger gasps like his entire family line has been insulted and stumbles backwards. It’s kind of endearing, and the thought only makes Kageyama more annoyed. “You- you mean I don’t throw well?! I mean, I only play casually, but I thought I’d be _better_ \- don’t tell me Stingyshima was right!” He falls onto his knees and stares at his hands like they’d betrayed him.

Kageyama stares at him. “Uh.”

The stranger scrambles to his feet so fast Kageyama feels like he’s gotten whiplash just from watching him. “I’ll make you say my throws are the best, just you wait! I’ll work super hard! Yeah!” With that, he grabs the Frisbee from where it’s fallen to the ground next to Kageyama and shoots him a grin and a thumbs up before running back to the open field, where a figure is playing on a 4DS. “Kenma! Let’s keep playing!”

Kageyama stares after him, feeling a weird mixture of drained and hyped, and doesn’t understand anything at all.

\--

Kageyama finds himself thinking about the orange-haired Frisbee guy for the remainder of the school day and on the walk home, and when he looks through the notes he’d taken in class he finds pages upon pages of gibberish. He sighs and rests his forehead against the kitchen table. He’ll have to ask the teacher for what he’d missed.

“Tobio, I’m home!”

Kageyama sits up abruptly. His heart is beating erratically- his mom _never_ comes home even remotely close to this hour, and the excited ring to her voice is worlds away from the drained croak he knows so well.

“Mom?” He makes his way to the front entrance, where his mother is kicking off her shoes, beaming to herself, and finds himself smiling with her despite not knowing why.

“Oh, Tobio,” she says, wrapping her arms around him. He breathes in her scent- she doesn’t use perfume, doesn’t dream of ever affording a decent brand, but her smell is comforting and pleasant nevertheless. “You’ll never guess what happened.” She leans back, hands on his shoulders, and smiles at him tearfully. “We got a customer, Tobio. A huge company. The business is finally starting to pick up. Do you know what this means?”

“…we won’t be poor anymore,” he realizes, as pieces of his dream start coming back to him through the expanse of his mind.

“We won’t have to skip meals,” his mom confirms, and Kageyama is starting to choke up. “We won’t have to ask relatives for money, we won’t have to sort through overdue bills-”

“We’ll be happy,” he finishes, crying despite himself, and in any other instance he’d be embarrassed but dammit, this justifies it. This justifies everything. “We’ll be happy, mom.”

She nods, sniffling. “I can’t wait to tell your father.”

_If you were to have a lot of money or a lot of time, which would you choose?_

_Money._

_Money._

_Happiness._

\--

“Hey, Scary Guy! You’re looking happy today!”

Kageyama bites on his straw. Of course.

He looks up, finishing the last of his milk ( _he can buy milk cartons now, he can actually look at the vending machines without bitterness killing his appetite_ ), and watches the same orange blur from the day before come charging right at him. He frowns, because he doesn’t really know _how_ to feel and frowning is easy and familiar.

“Here.” Kageyama looks at the paper bag that’s just been dropped in his lap, comfortingly heavy and letting off a scent that makes his mouth water. “Kenma made me buy you this, to apologize for hitting you in the face with a Frisbee.” Orange’s mouth curls downwards in petulance. “I _told_ him we should’ve played volleyball instead…”

 _That_ gets his interest. He sits up. “You play volleyball?”

Orange waves his hand. “Nah, not really. Kenma does though, and sometimes he lets me spike. Spiking is fun,” he says, and grins.

Kageyama slouches again. “Oh.” He tries to blink his disappointment away. It’s not like he plays either, anymore; he’d given that up long ago.

“What about you? Do you play volleyball too?” Orange is sitting down beside him, a little too close for comfort, eyes a little too wide with excitement.

“I used to,” he says to his empty milk carton, frowning deeper. “I decided to focus on my studies, though.”

“Huh? Why would you do that? That’s stupid.” Kageyama looks up sharply, but Orange barely blinks. “If you liked it a lot, you should have continued with it.”

“It’s not that easy,” he says, anger rising slowly in his chest, an anger he’s never felt before; simple, unmarred by bitterness or hatred or thick green envy. “What if I was bad at it, huh?” He wasn’t, he was the best in his team, and quitting destroyed him, but he doesn't mention that.

“Then work harder!” Orange is leaning forward, cheeks flushed, and Kageyama feels slightly uncomfortable at the gradually increasing proximity. “Who cares if you’re not good? As long as you like it, as long as it’s what you want to do, it’s worth it, right?”

“Dumbass, it’s not always worth it!” Orange doesn’t flinch at the insult but Kageyama recoils, feeling bad despite himself. “What about you?” he mumbles, opening the paper bag in his lap and tamping down a sharp inhale at the sight of two steaming pork buns nestled at the bottom. “What do you like?”

“Being happy.” Orange’s answer is serious and maybe a little breathtaking, and Kageyama looks up into those wide brown eyes and feels something that both terrifies and exhilarates him. “That’s all that matters to me.”

Kageyama averts his gaze to his lap until he can breathe properly again. “I’m Kageyama Tobio,” he mumbles, because what else can he say?

It’s trivial to him, this information, but it seems to brighten Orange’s day because when he looks up those wide brown eyes are sparkling and closer than ever. “I’m Hinata Shoyou!” Oran- Hinata says cheerfully, extending a hand. Kageyama is about to reach forward when they’re interrupted.

“Hinata.” It’s the same person from before, Kageyama notes, a short, timid-looking guy with bleached hair that looks like it hasn’t been touched up in months and unnervingly cat-like eyes. “Lunch break is almost over,” he says in a quiet deadpan, holding a wrapped bento box in one of his hands. “You should eat your lunch now.”

“Right!” Hinata scrambles to his feet with the same sound-barrier-breaking speed, and is already by the new guy’s side in a blink. “I’ll see you, Kageyama! Hope you enjoy the meat buns!”

Kageyama waves dazedly after his retreating form, and wonders if Hinata will ever make him feel _not_ confused.

\--

Kageyama is walking out of his classroom, the ring of the bell still rattling around in his head, when he by chance glances into the adjacent room and this is _ridiculous_.

It’s ridiculous because _Hinata Shoyou_ of all people is standing there, in his signature beige sweater underneath the uniform jacket, talking to a teacher. Kageyama scowls and moves to walk away, but something about the look on his face catches his eye.

For the first time since Kageyama has met him, Hinata looks… _sad_. His eyes are downcast, mouth set in a tight line like he’s trying his hardest not to cry, and as the teacher’s voice carries over to where Kageyama is, he realizes why.

“Have you _ever_ gotten a double-digit score in your _life_?” The teacher is holding a test paper in his hand, rolled up and poised in the air as if to beat Hinata with it, and the thought of that makes darkness coil in Kageyama’s stomach. “I can’t imagine what it’s like, being your parents. They must be really disappointed in you, huh. I would be, if my kid had no future like you. Maybe you should just drop out and settle for living on welfare.”

How is this guy a _teacher_ ? Kageyama is about to step in, maybe risk his clean reputation for this _stupid, stupid_ ball of energy and apparently single-digit test scores, when someone passes him and enters the doorway, teacher ID card swinging from the lanyard around their neck. “Sensei, that’s enough!”

“Takeda-sensei, you don’t know the kind of pain this kid has been bringing me-”

“Does it matter?” It’s a man, probably around late twenties to early thirties, although his bright eyes and round face could easily fool someone into believing he’s younger. “He’s a good kid, and he doesn’t do anything to hurt others. I can’t really say the same for you, sensei.”

“Why, you-” Kageyama realizes he’s grinning to himself and promptly stops.

He’s turning back towards the end of the hallway when he feels wind on his back, and glances behind him just in time to see Hinata marching out of the doorway, faster than any person’s walking speed should be, rubbing angrily at his eyes. He’s turning heads as he speed-walks down the hall, but he seems to be unaware of his surroundings. Kageyama hates to admit it, but he feels sorry for the guy.

Kageyama sighs, and stares at his school bag and the piles of homework hidden within it. _And to think I was looking forward to going home today,_ he thinks, before running after Hinata.

\--

The chase leads Kageyama out the courtyard and through the winding streets of the Miyagi suburbs, up low hills and down sweeping valleys. He’s running out of breath; maybe chasing after someone with freakish speed and stamina wasn’t such a good idea.

Thankfully, just as his lungs are starting to feel like sandpaper he stops at a small playground, two slides and a swing set. Behind him, the sun is starting to set, tops of trees lit afire by the colors filling the sky. There’s the telltale sign of creaking chains, and when Kageyama looks over there’s Hinata on the swing set, dragging his feet aimlessly against the damp sand beneath him.

“Hey.” Kageyama trudges over, trying not to let the jelly-like feeling in his legs or the labored quality of his breathing show.

Hinata angles his shoulders away from him, and in the colors of the sunset his orange hair seems to glow with an almost ethereal quality. “Go away,” he says, voice thick. “I don’t want to talk.”

“Who says I ever wanted to talk, dumbass?” Kageyama approaches him anyway, and sits on the swing next to his, kicking off. The swing is a little low, so he has to lean back to accommodate.

“You’re mean,” Hinata sniffs, but there’s a grateful undercurrent to his voice that suggests he doesn’t mean what he says. They sit in silence for a bit, stillness punctuated only by the rhythmic creak of the chains, and Kageyama swings higher and higher until he can feel cold wind biting against exposed skin.

Finally, there’s a quiet, almost imperceptible clearing of throat from beside him, and Kageyama glances over as Hinata, shoulders hunched, glare fixed at the ground, mumbles, “I _hate_ feeling sad.”

“Everyone hates feeling sad, dumbass,” Kageyama tells the sky, leaning back until he’s lying completely horizontal on the swing. “But it’s not so bad when you’re used to it.”

“Maybe _you’re_ used to it, but I’m not,” Hinata says, kicking off and swinging into the air.

Kageyama sits upright again, and makes a noncommittal grunt. Hinata’s right.

They stay there, swinging higher and higher as the sun dips lower and lower into the horizon, until dark blue washes out the pinks and oranges and lilacs in the sky and stars start glimmering in the far distance. They stay there even as the night chill creeps under their collars and wraps around their ankles. They stay there until Hinata’s tears dry, until Kageyama’s head starts hurting from the wind.

Finally, after Kageyama’s sure an hour has passed, Hinata’s feet drag across the sand and bring his momentum to an abrupt stop. There’s a rustle of papers, a soft grunt as Hinata swings his backpack over his shoulder, and then Hinata is waving as he leaves the playground. “See you, Kageyama.”

Kageyama stops himself, too, reeling from the sudden change in balance, and nods. “Yeah.”

“Thanks,” Hinata’s eyes are brighter than the lamppost behind him, light casting shadows across his face. “For staying.”

Kageyama nods again, because he’s never been good with words. “Yeah.”

Kageyama sits there for a little while longer, watching Hinata’s silhouette fade into the darkness of the street, before standing up and collecting his stuff. There’s a piece of paper sitting on his backpack, edges rough like it was ripped out of a notebook, with messy, almost childlike writing in the middle: _You should be happy, Kageyama._

“Dumbass,” Kageyama says, looking up. “Of course I’m happy.”

He’d chosen money, after all.

\--

After that, Hinata makes it his personal mission to make Kageyama his best friend, and Kageyama would say he minded if it wasn’t such a lie.

Of course, exposure to Hinata inevitably means exposure to all his friends. Kenma is as quiet and deadpan as his first impression, hands seemingly surgically attached to his 4DS; Kageyama wonders why he even hangs out with Hinata, because the latter’s energetic nature seems to visibly drain Kenma of his already lacking will to live. Lev is a half-Russian giant as loud as Hinata and even more unapologetic. Yamaguchi and Tsukishima are both in his class, and Yamaguchi is mild-mannered and easygoing, but his friend… Kageyama shudders at the memory of a condescending smirk and taunting words, and decides to avoid the tall four-eyed blondie named Tsukishima for the sake of perhaps the entire human race.

And Hinata. Hinata _dumbass_ Shoyo. Kageyama could write paragraphs about him.

About how he’s terrible at studying but loves his parents and little sister to bits. How he’s good at virtually every sport because he’s got sick reflexes, superhuman speed and an incredible vertical. How he owns maybe four or five of the same beige sweater because they’re comfortable, and his sister likes the way they smell. How he hates being called short and underestimated for his height and, when he gets really into something, how he puts his all into it and aims for nothing but the top. How he’s the only one other than Tsukishima who can rile Kageyama up, make him shout and compel him to sprint up a hill screaming.

How he planted his handprint into the very fibres of Kageyama’s soul, and made sure it would never fade.

\--

Hinata barges into Kageyama’s classroom one day after school, dumps his backpack on top of his desk and glares down at him. “You,” he says, as threateningly as possible considering his voice is like an octave higher than Kageyama’s, “are going to help me study.”

Kageyama stares up at him through his bangs. “And why would I do that?” He already has to work hard enough by himself; he doesn’t know if his health will hold up under the added weight of helping someone else too. “Can’t you just ask Tsukishima?”

A look akin to that of a war veteran passes over Hinata’s face. “Believe me, I’ve… I’ve tried. Besides,” he reanimates with that same whiplash speed that leaves Kageyama reeling, “you’re good at this kind of stuff, right? You’re in the enhanced class after all.”

Kageyama huffs. “Do you really think I’m naturally smart? Answer me this.” He stands up, looming over Hinata and glaring as hard as he can. “How do you think I manage to stay in shape? I don’t play any sports, and you’ve seen how much I can eat.” It’s true; he’s started being liberal with how much food he’s eating, without having to think of the emptiness in the fridge or in his parents’ eyes.

“Uh…” Hinata’s eyes flicker up and down Kageyama’s frame, leaving heat tingling just under his skin in their wake. Kageyama blinks the sensation away. “A really fast metabolism?” he suggests.

“No.” He steps closer, back to the window so his entire face is cast in shadow, and Hinata raises his arms in defence. “Whenever exams are around the corner, I study so hard I forget to eat.” It’s partially the truth: he doesn’t mention the other part, which is that he can’t eat without feeling guilty. “Do you really want me to tutor _you_ as well?”

Hinata looks horrified, and Kageyama’s not sure if it’s because of his terrible eating habits or the fact that he probably looks like an academic helldemon right now. “Y-you don’t… eat? But… exams are next month… does that mean you…”

Kageyama hits the top of Hinata’s head with the side of his hand. “That’s irrelevant, dumbass! What matters is that I can’t teach you!”

“Do you know anyone else?” Hinata looks like a dog when he’s sad, all shiny and mournful.

   “Yachi from Class 5,” Kageyama _swears_ he’s not weak for that look, “we talk sometimes. She can probably help you.”

   “Okay!” Hinata bounces out of the classroom without looking back, leaving a dazed Kageyama in his wake.

    “Dumbass,” Kageyama mutters, closing his eyes and trying to sleep.

\--

The next day, Hinata runs into Kageyama’s classroom less than a second after the lunch bell rings and grabs his hand. “Come on, you jerk! I’m going to make sure you eat!”

“H- hey! You can’t just do that, dumbass!” Kageyama shouts, but Hinata is ridiculously fast and his grip on Kageyama’s wrist is so strong it’ll probably leave bruises. “What if I left my stuff back in there?”

“Who cares? Your health matters more! Who’s the dumbass now, dumbass?”

Kageyama’s frowning intensely when they stop at the front of a convenience store a block away from the school, small and modest, and Hinata yells a greeting as he walks in. Behind the counter, feet propped up, is a man, probably a few years past college age, with blonde hair slicked back, multiple piercings and the glowing red ember of a cigarette dangling between his lips. “Oh, hey, it’s Chibi-chan,” he says, adjusting his position in his office chair. “Is this the ‘best friend’ you keep talking abo-”

“Ah! N-no, that’s- I dunno what you’re talking about, I uh- this is Kageyama!” Hinata, red-faced, shoves Kageyama in front of him. “Kageyama, say hi!”

“I’m not your dog, dumbass,” Kageyama mutters to him, before turning and bowing to the guy manning the counter. “Sorry for the intrusion.”

“You could be a dog, though,” Hinata says as the man waves him off, dragging Kageyama by the wrist over to the rows of freezers. “Actually, wait, you’re too dumb to be a dog.”

“Hey!” Kageyama is giving his best glower, one that has frightened even teachers, so why is Hinata looking back at him with such nonchalance? “Don’t drag me here just to insult me, dumbass! I could be studying right now! I can’t afford to fall behind-”

Hinata is shaking his head so vigorously Kageyama is beginning to wonder why he hasn’t already broken half of his spine. “What you can’t afford is to not eat well, Stupidyama.”

 _If only you knew_ , Kageyama thinks. But what comes out of his mouth is, “Why do you care about me so much?”

Hinata is already at the counter paying for the two popsicles in his hand, and before Kageyama can protest there’s a hand on his wrist again and the bell above the door is jingling as they walk out. He squints in the bright afternoon sun, snatching the popsicle Hinata offers out of his hand. He’s grateful, really, but it’s at this moment that his brain reminds him of his emotional inarticulacy and he can only grunt.

They start walking back, to where Kageyama assumes is Hinata’s house. Hinata’s oddly quiet, and when Kageyama glances over to make sure he’s okay the sight of orange light on orange hair and the tip of a lightly freckled nose makes him startle and almost drop his popsicle.

His jump makes Hinata turn to look at him, and the shift of shadows across his face abruptly cuts off any attempt Kageyama’s mind is making to create a reasonable train of thought. “Are you okay?”

“Yes,” he says, but what he’s thinking is _no, I feel like I can’t breathe and most of me doesn’t know why but part of me is thinking maybe it’s because of you_. “You still haven’t answered my question, by the way- and where are we even going? You don’t know where I live.”

Hinata shrugs, and it’s that action that makes Kageyama notice how small his frame is, all narrow shoulders and bony limbs masking the extent of his ridiculous physical prowess. “Yachi’s busy today, so you’re tutoring me.”

“And when were you going to consult me about this?” Kageyama snaps, scowling. He doesn’t really mind, not really, but his words tend to come out wrong when he’s caught off guard.

Hinata grins at him, finally breaking the eerie, stifling silence and Kageyama feels like he can breathe again. “Don’t use such big words like _consult_ , Stupidyama. You might get a fever.”

“What? Why you little-” Kageyama roars, reaching his arms out to give Hinata a piece of his mind, but of course the orange-haired shorty picks that exact moment to take off, laughing and leaping into the air. “Hey! Get back here! I’ll give _you_ a fever!”

\--

In general, Kageyama doesn’t question his decisions often. He’s too busy studying hard and rationing food to think about where his life is going, mind too occupied with equations and exam dates for regret. But lately, ever since Hinata came barrelling into his life, he’s started to seriously doubt his mental state.

Exhibit A: Sitting in one of the quiet study booths at the library, surrounded by open textbooks and loose papers filled with equations and study notes, Hinata next to him and occasionally throwing eraser shavings at him. He texts his mom that he’ll be home late, and sits up with much effort.

“Kageyama, I’m gonna fail!” Hinata wails, face-planting into the desk. “I’m a disappointment to my entire family tree, I’m going to bring _dishonor_ to my _ancestors_.”

“You’re right,” Kageyama says bluntly, shoving a hand in Hinata’s face to muffle the resulting screech of agony. “You should just stop trying and resign yourself to a life of academic failure.”

“Stop using big words, you’re making me feel worse,” Hinata huffs, pushing himself upright only to fall against Kageyama’s shoulder, hand pressed against his forehead dramatically. Kageyama takes a moment from studying to contemplate how Hinata’s hair can possibly glow in the dark. He then takes a few more moments to scream internally at the fact that _Hinata is slumped against his shoulder._ “I hate you, Stupidyama,” he mumbles. “You’re literally the worst.”

Kageyama makes a harsh buzzer sound deep in the back of his throat and flicks Hinata’s head through a mop of orange hair. “Incorrect use of the word ‘literally’. Do I need to quiz you on English again, dumbass?”

“I _hate_ you,” Hinata insists, and Kageyama muffles a laugh.

\--

“You still haven’t answered my question,” Kageyama points out as Hinata’s waving goodbye, squinting in the light from the lamp post above. “Why do you care about me so much, Hinata?”

Something in Hinata’s expression shuts down. “Because,” he says, grinning, and Kageyama wants to slap him because _dumbass, I can tell you’re faking it_. “We’re best friends, right?”

Kageyama scoffs. “Right.”

“ _Mean_ , Stupidyama!”

\--

Two months into their best-friendship, Kageyama finds out that Hinata’s friend group is actually much more extensive than he originally thought it was.

He figures it out as he’s sitting in Hinata’s classroom at lunch, yelling over test scores and trying his best not to acquaint his textbook with a mop of orange hair, and the door slams open and two voices yell, “sorry for the intrusion!” in unison. Kageyama looks up along with the other occupants of the room as two second-years walk in. One has a shaved head and a weird-looking expression like he’s been kicked in the balls midway through a sneer; the other wears a mischievous glint in his eye and spiked hair trying to compensate for lacking height. A single strand in the front is bleached blonde, and it flops against his forehead as he calls, “Shoyou!” and makes his way over to where Hinata and Kageyama are sitting.

“Oh, Noya-san! Tanaka-san!” Hinata is cheerful, undisturbed by the intimidating air radiating off the newcomers. “I haven’t seen you guys in a while! What’s up?”

“We’re meeting up at Daichi’s for a sleepover after school, you should come!” Despite looking like he still bakes mud pies and pulls on girls’ braids, the short second-year’s voice is rough and pitched low, like hearing a lion’s roar come out of a bunny.

“Oh?” Baldy, who’d stayed silent the entire time, leans forward, staring straight at Kageyama with that same constipated look. “Who’s this punk? What business do you have with Hinata?”

“This is Kageyama, my best friend!” Hinata says before Kageyama can say anything, putting an arm around his shoulders. “He can be kind of a jerk sometimes, and he always looks like he ate something funny for breakfast, but-” Hinata cuts off his sentence to dodge a swipe at his head “-but he’s cool. He’s in the same class as Yamaguchi and Tsukishima.”

“Dumbass!” Kageyama yanks Hinata’s arm off his shoulder and moves to hit him again, only for Hinata to attempt an easily dodged counterattack. They go on like this for a little while longer, all grabbing hands and animalistic noises. “Don’t speak for me!”

Finally, they both give up simultaneously, sitting back and glaring at each other. “It’s a habit! It’s not my fault you’re socially inadequate!” Hinata pouts.

“Stop using big words, you’re gonna get a fever.”

“That’s _my_ line!”

“So,” Tanaka coughs loudly, and Kageyama turns to stare at him. Out of the corner of his eye, he can see Hinata mirroring his movement. “What are you guys, childhood friends or something? How come I never saw him in middle school?”

“Oh no, we met at the beginning of this semester,” Hinata explains, waving his hands frantically in front of him. Noya and Tanaka exchange a glance, one that Kageyama can’t understand, but when he looks over at Hinata he’s met with complete ignorant bliss. _Dumbass_. “We’re still best friends, though.”

Noya grins, patting Hinata’s head affectionately. “Sure, sure, whatever you say, Hinata. But you can’t fool your senpais so easily.” He breaks off when Tanaka nudges him, pointing at a shadow approaching ominously in the hallway. His brown eyes widen, and he seems to shrink. “Shit, I really wanna stay a little longer, but Ennoshit’s coming for us. See you, Hinata!”

When they’re gone, Kageyama turns towards Hinata, who is a mild shade of red. “What were you trying to fool them about?”

Hinata’s blush deepens so drastically that Kageyama wonders if there isn’t something wrong with him. “Nothing,” he says quickly, and plants his face in his lunchbag and doesn’t say anything for five minutes.

\--

Later, Kageyama learns that the second-years’ names are Tanaka Ryuunosuke and Nishinoya Yuu, and that they are probably the worst influences he’s ever seen.

He’s not sure how or why he let Hinata drag him to this sleepover with people he either a) was forced into being best friends with (Hinata), b) barely knows but is pretty sure they’re terrified of him/he should be terrified of them (Yamaguchi, Tanaka, Nishinoya), c) despises vehemently with every fibre of his being (Tsukishima), but here he is, watching his mother’s (new) car and his only form of escape disappear into the night.

Kageyama closes his eyes, and sighs. This is his life. These are his choices.

\--

“Whoa! Your sleeping bag is so cool, Kageyama! Is it new?”

Kageyama looks up from where he’s laying out his stuff on the floor, only to lock gazes with two pairs of equally wide brown eyes. Nishinoya and Hinata are crouching around him like two hyperexcited, mildly aggravating bats. “Uh… yeah. My mom bought it for me on my way here, actually.”

“Why? Have you never used a sleeping bag before?” Nishinoya’s question is innocent, but Kageyama flinches anyways. Now that he doesn’t have to worry about the cost of every single thing he does, his recently terminated lifestyle of penny pinching and counting spare change seems embarrassing, a dark part of his life that he’d like to bury in the shadows.

“My family… doesn’t really like the outdoors,” he lies. “I’ve never needed a sleeping bag before.”

Hinata opens his mouth, and Kageyama can almost physically _see_ the stupid question hovering on the tip of his tongue, but suddenly there’s a hand ruffling his hair in an uncomfortably maternal display of affection and a gray-haired third year is joining their circle before he can even blink. “Nishinoya, what did I say about tormenting the first-years?”

Nishinoya makes a grumbling sound under his breath. “Suga-san, you’re no fun.”

Sugawara Koushi laughs, eyes crinkling in a way that suggests familiarity and warmth. “We don’t want to scare him away, Noya.”

“Sorry, mom,” Nishinoya mutters, and quickly ducks out of the subsequent swipe at his head to go gripe at Tanaka about running out of hair gel.

“Sorry about him,” Suga says apologetically, smoothing out a crease in the corner of Kageyama’s sleeping bag and absentmindedly rearranging the pile of clothes in front of him. “Usually Daichi or Ennoshita’s around to take care of those two, but they’re both downstairs making snacks.”

Kageyama doesn’t recognize either of the two names, but he doesn’t mention it as Suga ruffles his hair again and stands up to mother the shit out of someone else. When he’s gone, Hinata turns towards him, smiling a little hopeful smile that Kageyama’s never seen before. “So, what do you think about everyone?”

“They’re… interesting,” Kageyama settles on after much thought. _I’ve never hung out with this many people for something unrelated to academics before. Actually, I don’t think I’ve ever hung out for non-academic reasons, period,_ is what he thinks, though, and these thoughts make him kind of annoyed, so he draws his knees up to his chest and frowns intensely at the floor.

He doesn’t expect Hinata to laugh, shifting closer to him. “They’re crazy, huh? But that’s why they’re so fun. It’s almost like one big dysfunctional family.”

“…okay,” is all Kageyama can say.

“Hey!” Daichi claps his hands from across the room, drawing everyone’s attention. _He’s a natural leader_ , Kageyama thinks, surveying the way he holds himself and the presence that seems to take up the entire room and a little more. “We’re gonna start our games now; everyone if favor of Mario Kar-”

“WOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!’ This comes from Nishinoya, Tanaka and Hinata, from various parts of the room like horrifically energetic surround-sound speakers.

“Shut up!” Daichi roars, and Kageyama feels the hairs on the back of his neck stand up. “...anyone in favor of Gin Rummy?” When he’s met with silence, he sighs with resignation. “Why does no one want to play, it’s a good ga-”

“When you tried to teach us,” Nishinoya points out, “we fell asleep. Remember?”

The tall, scary guy with the long hair and permanent five-o’clock shadow that Kageyama remembers as Azumane Asahi and, alternately, ‘Noya’s ultimate demise’ laughs and pats Daichi on the shoulder. Behind him, he thinks he can hear Nishinoya choking. “Sorry, Daichi, but it’s true. You’re a seventy-year-old man amongst elementary school kids.”

Kageyama leans towards Hinata as Daichi makes a sad noise in defeat. “What’s Mario Kart?”

Hinata jumps back like he’s been burned, hands over his heart in that same exuberant display of unnecessary drama that had made Kageyama want to smack him in the face with his own Frisbee the first time they’d met. “No sleeping bag and now this? Did you not have a childhood, Kageyama?”

Kageyama stiffens involuntarily, ducking his head and rubbing the memories of threadbare clothes out of the backs of his eyelids. “I… I told you, I was busy studying,” he mumbles, but all the bite he’d been aiming for has melted against the poison still residing deep in his gut. “Not everyone can be as carefree as you, dumbass.” _And especially not me._ Because there’s still that bitterness in him, unable to be washed away by things like the shine of his parents’ new car or the curtains that now decorate his room.

And, hand-in-hand with that bitterness, is a fear that maybe that’s all he is, maybe that’s how he is defined; maybe one day he’ll look up from his pages and pages of study notes and look in the mirror and see only a green-eyed monster staring back.

“Hey, Stupidyama. Are you okay? The others are already gone,” and there’s Hinata’s voice, pulling him out of the darkness. Kageyama looks up into wide brown eyes, and _oh_ , suddenly the feeling of not being able to breathe is back and stronger than ever and he should probably get it checked out.

Something in his eyes makes Hinata visibly recoil, and he scrambles backwards on his butt a couple inches. “I- I can leave you alone if you want,” he stammers, and Kageyama wants to slap him for getting flustered so easily. “I’ll tell the others you’re lame and an older old man than Daichi and that you need your _beauty sleep_ \- _”_

“Hey!” Kageyama roars, and Hinata giggles, darting out of the way. “What did I say about talking for me, dumbass?”

\--

“This is really unfair…” Hinata gripes, climbing into his sleeping bag and zipping it up. “You’re in the advanced class _and_ you’re good at Mario Kart? You really make me angry sometimes, Stupidyama!”

Suga shushes him as he’s passing by, stepping over Nishinoya’s sleeping form. “Go to sleep, Hinata. You’ve been complaining about Kageyama winning the tournament for a good ten minutes.”

“No fair!” Hinata pouts, pointing to the corner where the other two third-years in the group are sitting, hunched over an open textbook. “They’re still awake!”

“That’s because they have a practice test tomorrow,” Suga reminds him gently, clicking off the light and bathing the room in darkness save for the little third-year corner. “If you want to study with us, be our guest.”

Even as his eyes are adjusting to the darkness, Kageyama can see a blur of orange hair swinging back and forth nervously and scoffs to himself. Studying isn’t so bad after a while; it’s almost calming, the way volleyball used to be. “If you break your neck shaking your head I’m going to laugh about it at your grave.”

“You’re so _mean_ , Stupidyama!”

“Oi!” Daichi hisses. “Go to sleep!”

“Y-yes!”

\--

The clock mounted on the wall reads 3AM when Hinata speaks up for the first time in an hour. “Hey, Stupidyama? Don’t think this is stupid.”

Kageyama manages a snort through his shock, because _holy hell he knew I was awake_? “I think everything you do is stupid, dumbass.”

Hinata makes a disgruntled crow noise. “Stop being a jerk for once and listen to me, Kageyama! I- I’m…”

“Yes?” Kageyama sounds irritated, but he knows Hinata is aware that’s pretty much his automatic setting. “Spit it out.”

“...I’m scared of the dark,” Hinata finishes, shame radiating from every word.

Kageyama tries not to scoff, he really does, it’s just his nature. “What do you want me to do, hold your hand?”

“No, it’s just- never mind.” There’s a shifting of blankets; he’s probably turning onto his side, facing away from Kageyama. “You’re right, it’s stupid. Good night, Kageyama.”

“No- wait,” Kageyama interrupts the one-sided conversation, trying to find the right words to say. “I didn’t- look,” and he subconsciously shifts over, although it’s not like Hinata will know anyway, and attempts to reach out before thinking better of it and letting his hand drop to the floor. “What are you so scared of, dumbass?”

“The _dark_ , duh,” and Hinata would appear more infuriatingly smug if Kageyama couldn’t see him shaking under his sleeping bag. “My mom, she- she’s got this disease where fluid builds up in her head and stuff, and one time she went blind for a few minutes and- I keep thinking, _maybe I’ll get it too_. Maybe I’ll wake up and I won’t be able to tell the difference between closing my eyes and opening them.”

Kageyama stares up into the inky black of the ceiling, speechless for the first time in his life. Subconsciously, he’s always assumed that Hinata had the perfect life - how could anyone not, if they saw how constantly happy he was? _But maybe_ , he thinks, _maybe it’s not the lack of sadness that makes him so happy, but the presence of it._

_Maybe he’s suffering just as much as I am, and because he’s so much stronger no one can ever tell._

Kageyama reaches for Hinata, because he’s never known what to say in any situation, let alone this one. The sound of him shifting in his sleeping bag rouses the redhead lying in front of him, and he rolls back over, too, so they’re face-to-face. Hinata’s expression is unreadable- but not in a bad way, like a mystery you’ll never quite solve. This feels more like a puzzle designed specifically to be solved.

Silently, across time and space and two hearts beating erratically, a hand slides across the polished floor to interlock with his own.

“Better?” Kageyama can’t remember ever being this quiet. He can’t remember Hinata ever staying so still before, either; but in the darkness, in the silence, it doesn’t register as strange.

Hinata hums an affirmation. “Better.”

The others find them in the morning like this, face-to-face on their sides, hands still together.

\--

“So…” Kageyama looks up and finds himself flanked by Nishinoya and Tanaka, having apparently crept up on him as he was eating his lunch. Hinata is staying in class for lunch today, to go over some questions he’d missed on the test with the teacher; Kageyama had bullied him into doing so, unwittingly giving himself an entire lunch break alone at their usual spot. “You and Hinata, huh?”

Kageyama meets their waggling eyebrows and suggestive smirks with an even gaze. “I don’t follow,” he says, blankly.

Apparently, it’s simultaneously the best and worst thing to say, judging from the way the two second-years groan and recreate death scenes from Shakespearean tragedies in varying degrees of accuracy. “Oh, this generation,” Nishinoya says, tears in his eyes, and Kageyama is feeling tired already. “So young. So unaware.”

Kageyama blinks at him. “No disrespect or anything, but,” he says, “I’m only a year younger than you-”

“There’s nothing we can do,” Tanaka agrees. “We can only throw our hearts into the betting pool.”

Nishinoya brightens at that, and Kageyama desperately wants to say something, but the duo are already walking away. “What betting pool?” he asks, weakly, and stares at the same spot in incomprehension until a passersby calls the nurse to check if he’s okay.

\--

Another Hinata habit, filed away within an alarmingly large stack of information: dressing appropriately isn’t, apparently, a conceivable concept to him.

Kageyama learns this the first day temperatures dip below zero, a mid-November afternoon just as they’re being released from school. It’s been creeping up on them the past few weeks, cold seeping in at the edges of the fabric of the sky, and has finally manifested into an almost tangible blanket of eerily still briskness. Students are beginning to bundle up, in scarves and jackets and heavy boots, faces disappearing behind wool in an attempt to be immune to the cold. Kageyama himself is waiting for Hinata decked in a (new) felt coat, knit beanie and heat-sealing boots.

Naturally, Hinata comes out in nothing but a thin jacket over his regular school uniform.

Kageyama reaches out to smack him wordlessly, anger rendering him speechless, and Hinata covers his head and ducks. “Hey!” _The dumbass, like he has a right to be indignant._ “What’d I do this time, jerk?”

“You do realize,” Kageyama says, blunt and abrupt, grabbing the hood of Hinata’s sweater as he attempts to run away, “that it is currently negative two degrees outside, correct?”

“I don’t get cold easily,” Hinata boasts, puffing up his chest, but the display makes Kageyama think that maybe the statement is completely false. Of course, he doesn’t really care either way, so he shoots him one final glare and starts walking towards the doors, Hinata giving an indignant shout and sprinting after him.

\--

“O-oi, jerk.”

He resists the urge to grin triumphantly. _The feeling of being right never gets old_. “What did I tell you, dumbass?”

“Th-that’s… don’t be _mean_ , Kageyama, I’m _dying_. I can’t even take my hands off my bike.”

Kageyama closes his eyes, sighs to himself. Partway through their walk home, a howling wind had picked up, and they’d ducked into the nearest bus shelter out of sheer survival instinct. Now, even Kageyama’s feeling the cold, bundled up underneath layers of protection. Hinata must be going numb, if the alarming shade of red his hands have turned is any indication. Despite his chattering teeth and trembling frame, he hasn’t spoken a word of complaint until just then, evidently letting his pride and refusal to let Kageyama beat him in anything take over any logical thinking. _Dumbass_.

Unfortunately, Kageyama Tobio is, contrary to popular belief, _not_ heartless, so he reaches over and painstakingly peels Hinata’s fingers off his bike handles, wincing at the sharp cold. “You are so _stupid_ ,” he mutters, shooting down any attempt at protesting with a glare, “just because you couldn’t admit I was right.”

“I h- hate you, jerk,” but it’s barely coherent through the sound of chattering teeth, and Kageyama takes a minute to wonder what he’d ever done to deserve this amount of suffering before pulling Hinata closer. “Hey, what-?”

“Shut up or I’m kicking you out,” he growls, freeing one hand to unbutton his coat. “Don’t make me regret this,” and then he’s pulling Hinata to him, back to chest, and wrapping his coat around the both of them before he can get a chance to regret or question any of his actions. Hinata makes a choking sound, but doesn’t protest, and Kageyama thinks _good_ because this position renders him incapable of physically stopping the smaller boy from saying anything stupid. As a silent form of revenge for rendering his arms completely useless, Kageyama leans forward a little more, closing the miniscule gap between them, and rests his chin on the top of Hinata’s head. Orange hair tickles his jaw, impossibly soft, and he wonders what kind of shampoo he uses. Within the same breath, he also wonders if he’s even thinking straight.

The bus back to Hinata’s house is a rarely used local line, giving them ample time to stand in this position, trying not to catch the eye of any passersby. Kageyama’s never found himself to be someone who cares particularly about appearances - they don’t affect grades, after all - but Hinata does, apparently, caught agonizingly between burrowing deeper into the shadow of the jacket and moving to Sub-Saharan Africa out of humiliation. “Man, this is embarrassing,” he mutters to himself, and Kageyama feels his blood spike inexplicably in unsolicited irritation.

“I thought all you cared about was being happy?” He leans closer, lowering his voice so the proximity of his mouth to Hinata’s ear won’t deafen the boy. Hinata shudders - from the cold, probably. “Why are you so stressed out over this?”

“Mom used to get stared at all the time, back when she still went out,” is the reply, and now Kageyama feels like the worst person in the world. “That’s why I hate it more than most people, I think. Hey!” As if sensing his emotions, Hinata straightens so abruptly that his head knocks Kageyama’s chin back painfully. “Don’t pity me, okay?”

“Sorry,” Kageyama mumbles, trying to ignore the pain shooting up his jaw.

They say nothing for a very, very long time - or perhaps just a few seconds, a few minutes, a small lifetime. (Because of course, in hindsight, that one moment means everything.) Outside, pedestrians power-walk home, eager to escape the cold; frost-tinted cars roll past in the sluggish pace of the lazy suburbian afternoon. Outside, the sky is a bright blue, and desiccated leaves skitter across old concrete, catching on rocks and small plants that had sprung up in the cracks of the sidewalk. Outside, there is movement, but inside that bus shelter, everything is still save for two hearts beating in nervous tandem, the air cold and yet very, very warm.

And then: “Oi, Stupidyama. It’s snowing.”

Kageyama’s breath catches in his throat and he looks up to find white powder drifting from the sky, the amount and pace you’d expect from a cheesy rom-com musical. If it were up to him, he’d be standing there completely motionless, watching the snow fall until they almost miss their bus. But then Hinata’s tugging on his jacket and pulling both of them forward, all the way until his head is sticking out of the shelter and he can catch snowflakes on his tongue.

Kageyama watches him in irritated amusement, face lit up in childish joy and the blinding white of the November sky. He’s warm, pressed up against him; warm and solid and full of life and all the things Kageyama hadn’t known he’d missed. Hinata’s arms feel small yet unbreakable within his, and as the bus rolls up to the stop with a lethargic screech, Kageyama wonders how he’s ever survived without the redhead next to him, lighting up his days. He doesn’t know if he’s ever felt so many emotions in the past fifteen years of his life than he does now.

Maybe this isn’t love, Kageyama thinks, as he lets go of Hinata and they board the bus together; maybe this isn’t love, but rather the feeling of belonging with someone, settling thick and comforting at the bottom of his soul.

(He’s wrong, of course. More wrong than he’s ever been in his life.)

\--

“Oh man, it’s really cold out, huh?” Hinata kicks his shoes off at the entrance and bounds into his empty house. “Do you want some hot chocolate?”

“Duh, dumbass,” Kageyama calls after his retreating figure, earning himself an indignant shout in response. He takes his shoes off, too, with notably less energy, and hangs his coat on the coat rack. Hinata’s house is messy, in a lived-in way - the occupants of the building are everywhere, in the minute details that add individuality to the otherwise generic complex. “You took all my warmth.” That’s a lie; if anything, Hinata is a walking furnace, heart full of embers.

Hinata’s reply is inaudible as he disappears into the kitchen, and by the time Kageyama joins him there the kettle is already on and he’s already got two mugs out, pouring hot chocolate packets into them. Outside, the sky and ground are such a uniformly blinding white that Kageyama has to squint to make out anything, and the furniture within the house is lined with a muted silver. “Take a seat,” Hinata says, and as he obliges, it strikes him how domestic it feels. Sitting at the dining table, watching Hinata’s back as he works, steam and a peaceful silence filling the air. _I could live like this_ , he thinks.

And then, _holy shit. Do I want to live like this?_

He’s saved from spiralling into a pit of despair by the mug of hot chocolate sliding into his view, steam billowing into his face. “Oi, jerk. If you keep scowling like that, you’re going to set the table on fire.”

Kageyama looks up, and forces his face into what he thinks is a smile. Judging from Hinata’s look of absolute horror and fear, he most likely failed. “What are you talking about, dumbass?”

“J-j-just drink the h-hot chocolate,” comes the stammered reply, accompanied by a look like Kageyama is the genderbent girl from the Ring. Kageyama complies, and with the first gulp he’s transferred all of the hot chocolate from the mug to his upper lip, and glares Hinata’s subsequent giggles into submission.

He waits patiently for Hinata to finish, looking everywhere but directly across from him where the redhead is sitting for fear of what emotions might stir. He catches sight of the markings in the doorframe, squints a little, and laughs despite himself. “You’re only 164 centimetres?”

Hinata splutters at that, and Kageyama leans away just in time to barely avoid a spray of hot chocolate. “I-I’m 165 centimetres if you round up? I’m not _that_ much shorter than you-”

Kageyama gives him an unimpressed look. “I’m 18 centimetres taller.”

“Okay, you know what, I bet I can jump higher,” comes the petulant challenge, but Kageyama can’t force himself to take Hinata seriously when he’s crossed-armed and pouting, burrowing deeper into the collar of his signature beige hoodie.

He scoffs, and deflects a swipe at his head. “Dumbass, don’t over-exert yourself and get sick. I don’t want to babysit you.”

“Hey! I’m not a baby, _you’re_ a baby.” Hinata smirks as if he’s just destroyed his opponent in a rap battle before jumping out of his seat so fast Kageyama jumps. “Come on! Let’s go to my room.”

Kageyama nods and follows him, feeling nothing because why would he feel anything? This is normal. He is normal. His heart rate is - okay, a little fast, but still normal.

Hinata’s door is wide open, and even from the landing the sheer amount of sunlight in the room is already evident. It overflows, spilling out past the door onto smooth mahogany floors, tinting the blue walls a few shades lighter. The room itself is exactly what he’d expected - a little cluttered but still clean, warm and well lived-in like the rest of his house. Despite the walls being mostly window, posters are everywhere, from Transformers to Tokyo FC to a row of swimsuit models standing on a beach. The bed is small and unmade, desk cluttered with notebooks abandoned midway through studying. Hinata moves to sit at the chair before seeing the pile of clothes stacked higher than himself atop it, freezes, then resigns to lying on his back on the floor instead.

He pats the space next to him, and Kageyama tenses. _Be normal,_ he reminds himself, because he is, why wouldn’t he be? This means nothing, after all. They’re just best friends, doing best friend things.

 _Best friends, doing best friend things_. Kageyama tries not to dissect the emotion that fills him at that sentence, because he knows he’s not going to like what he finds, and lies down too.

They spend an awkward moment in silence before Hinata sits up again. “Let’s put on some music.”

The music, filtering out of a slightly scratched-up radio, is some kind of rock anthem, full of drum rolls and guitar riffs and crowd chanting like the hyped-up opening to a sports anime. It seems, simultaneously, like something Hinata would always and would never listen to, but either way it’s Kageyama’s kind of music so he doesn’t question it.

As the last guitar chord fades away, there’s a singular second of quiet where Kageyama is aware of Hinata’s slow breaths next to him before another song kicks in, still in the same genre but softer, a haunting, beautiful voice singing of regrets and a love confession never spoken. It evokes the same feeling as before - something deep as the Marianas Trench and as foreboding as marching into hell, something Kageyama doesn’t want to explore because what it hides could either save or ruin his life. He can’t be the only one feeling this way - surely Hinata feels it too, surely this is merely proof of the band’s expert lyricism and not some warm, heavy thing lurking in his heart, and he turns his head to confirm this.

And Hinata is looking back.

Hinata is so, so close and looking back and suddenly the music swells, spilling over them, and it’s really not fair that Hinata got to be in front of the window because he’s lined with silver and his eyes are this beautiful deep, golden brown and he looks like- like-

Like an angel.

 _If you fall in love, your choice will be reversed_.

“No,” he says aloud.

“No?” Hinata asks, sitting up, but Kageyama can’t hear him, can’t hear anything over the accusing voice inside him sounding like his mother and screaming _you wanted to kiss him then, didn’t you? You said you wouldn’t fall in love but you did, didn’t you? You’re in love with Hinata Shoyou._

_I am in love with Hinata Shoyou._

_I broke my promise, and fell in love with Hinata, and now I am going to lose everything_.

“You can’t do this to me,” he says, and sits up, too, trying to forget how close they were, how their noses almost brushed, how he could feel Hinata’s warm breath fanning over his lips.

Orange hair, caramel eyes, a bright smile warming up his heart and a call of _oi, Stupidyama_ . His mother’s tearful, bright eyes, saying, _we’ll be happy again. We won’t have to suffer so much again._ He wants to hate Hinata, and really, why shouldn’t he? Hinata is ruining his life. After all, it’s not _his_ fault for loving Hinata.

It’s Hinata’s fault for being so damn lovable.

“I don’t _want_ more time,” he says to whoever may be listening up above and stands up to walk, walk straight out of the room and downstairs and out of the house even though he’s dressed only in a light sweater and his uniform pants, slippered feet slowly getting soaked by the crystal-white snow. He can’t bring himself to care, though, because all he wants is to get away from Hinata. Hinata, with all his loud sound effects and unlimited reserve of energy; Hinata, comically innocent yet perceptive and caring in all the ways that matter.

Hinata, taking away his money and giving time instead, taking away the new car, the new clothes, the new shine in the way his parents look at each other, and giving- what? What did he have to give in return? Kageyama’s not even sure if Hinata loves him back, and even if he did, he would break Hinata’s heart a thousand times if it meant financial security for him and his parents.

That last thought stops him short, standing beneath a lamppost in a deserted street. He’d readily admitted to be willing to hurt Hinata. Hinata, who has done nothing but make him feel wanted, warm, surrounded by friends when all he’s ever known is hours in his bedroom studying his life away. Who has done nothing but make him feel happy, and loved.

_And loved._

“Kageyama!”

Kageyama turns slowly. _Speak of the Devil._

“You forgot your jacket,” Hinata says through heavy panting, stopping just a few feet short to bend over and regain his breath. He’s barely visible through the mound of Kageyama’s clothes in his arms, only a tuft of orange hair peeking out at the top. Kageyama notes, with a sharp guilt, that Hinata is even less clothed than he is, fingers and ears a stark burning red. _How could I ever break a heart like this?_

“Y-you’re so _dumb_ ,” Kageyama splutters, hoping the insincerity of his words will convey just how grateful - and worried - he is. “You’re going to get frostbite, you dumbass! I’m not worth losing a finger!”

He closes the distance between them in a few strides and moves to take the pile of clothes out of Hinata’s trembling arms, but his hands close on nothing as Hinata darts away, shifting the pile to the side of his body so he can stare Kageyama head-on.

“Kageyama Tobio,” he says fiercely, and Kageyama must be getting hypothermia because he’s not all that cold anymore. “Do you really believe that?”

Kageyama stares back, not comprehending. “What-”

“Kageyama Tobio,” Hinata repeats, stepping closer, and the proximity plus how his name sounds in Hinata’s voice is really not great for his health, “ _you are worth dying for._ ” He dumps everything into Kageyama’s still-outstretched hands and puts his hands on his hips defiantly, and the glare he gives Kageyama would be intimidating if the tip of his nose weren’t so comically (and alarmingly) red. “Do you understand?”

Kageyama looks away, embarrassed. “Yes,” he grumbles under his breath, pulling on his coat with one hand while balancing everything else in the other.

“And,” Hinata continues, “I don’t know what got into you back there, but if you’re not going to tell me, then I respect your privacy. I won’t ask questions and we can act like everything is normal, if that’s what you want. Is that what you want?”

Kageyama nods, and wow, now he really feels bad, because Hinata is worth more than money, more than new clothes and curtains. Hinata is worth more than perhaps Kageyama himself, because if anything Kageyama knows he doesn’t deserve this orange ball of happiness brightening up his life. He _certainly_ doesn’t deserve to do anything dumb like break Hinata’s heart. “Thanks,” he mumbles, and actions speak louder than words so he quickly wraps his scarf around Hinata’s neck and most of Hinata’s face faster than he can protest. His gloves go on Hinata’s ice-numb hands, and for a second he wishes he’d bundled up more in the morning so he could pay him back better.

“Thanks,” Hinata says back to him, and Kageyama scoffs. _Dumbass, I should be the one saying that._

“Don’t die,” he says, flicking Hinata’s forehead. “Exams are coming up.”

Hinata’s protests echo loudly in the street as he walks away, and Kageyama grins the entire walk home.

\--

In the two weeks that it takes Kageyama to clear his head after The Incident, he realizes that the answer was incredibly simple all along.

He’d known, subconsciously, that choosing money meant his life would be cut short. He hadn’t considered the importance of that fact when he’d been making the choice and even long after he’d woken up, blind to all extraneous details, but even after that he figured out that hey, financial security is worth more than his life anyway, so what’s the big deal? Having a short life wouldn’t be so bad, considering the way he was living up until then - a life of studying alone, friendless and sleepless. In fact, in some ways an early death could be considered a blessing.

Of course, that was before Hinata.

Assuming what he was experiencing was love and not just an extreme, weirdly conditional fever, that meant that not only would his parents start losing money, and probably fast, he’d also have a larger reserve of time than others. A longer life. At first, Kageyama thinks that maybe he could fall out of love with Hinata and reverse everything, but maybe falling in love in the first place would render everything else after that irrelevant? The risks are too high for a task so difficult, so Kageyama gives up on that option.

Winter break is just around the corner when Kageyama figures it out, walking home.

With how high his grades are currently, it shouldn’t be a problem for him to get into Tokyo University as long as he keeps it up - and considering that the lifestyle of studying is already ingrained into his very being, that shouldn’t be too much of a problem. He’s been considering a career in medical sciences - high paying, enough to support his parents - with maybe a focus on sports, and with that in mind, if they really saved up the money that they currently had with how well his mom’s company is doing, they could settle decently into the middle-class and be stable long enough so that the day Kageyama gets a good job is the day their savings run out. He’s already well past the requirements for scholarships, too, so university tuition fees aren’t a problem.

Kageyama grins to himself, scaring away a flock of geese nearby. _All I have to do is study hard and pinch pennies_ , he says. _Been doing that my entire life_. He doesn’t need to fall out of love with Hinata, and that thought brings relief he’s a little embarrassed to be feeling.

And then, _holy shit I am in love with Hinata what the fuck do I do._

And because his life has the worst timing ever, of course it’s in the middle of Kageyama’s panic attack that he hears a familiar voice yell ‘oh, fuck!’ and the sound of multiple bags falling to the floor.

He looks up, and of course Hinata is standing only a few feet away, in front of a convenience store staring at a heap of plastic bags spilling their contents onto the sidewalk and- is he _crying_?

Kageyama jogs up to him, because when will he ever be able to resist Hinata Shoyou? “Oi, dumbass. Are you okay?”

Hinata looks up, and his eyes are definitely a little wet but they brighten anyways. The sight wedges a knife in Kageyama’s gut. _Yeah, there’s a lot of shit that comes with falling in love with your best friend, alright._ “Oh, hey, Stupidyama,” he greets, sniffling a little and wiping his face with his sleeve. Kageyama notes, distantly, that Hinata is sporting sweater paws, and wonders in the same breath why he feels like he’s going to faint.

“You didn’t answer my question,” Kageyama says, frustrated. “Are you okay?”

“Yup!” Hinata beams at him, so wide his eyes scrunch closed, and gives one last sniffle before straightening himself up. “I’ve been having a bad day, but now that you’re here it’s much better.”

Kageyama really, really wants to die.

But despite being emotionally stunted, he still knows his manners, so he bends down and picks up the bags Hinata had dropped. “Dumbass, don’t say things like that. You’ll give the wrong idea.”

He straightens, expecting some kind of verbal protest, a petulant pout, but Hinata’s face is frozen in shock when their eyes meet. Kageyama frowns. “Are you okay?”

The redhead snaps back to attention at those words, and offers another smile. This one doesn’t quite reach his eyes. “Of course, jerk. Come on, let’s go to my house.”

Kageyama stiffens a little. He hadn’t gone back to Hinata’s house since that incident two weeks back, despite constant invitations. He’s not sure what kind of reaction or emotions the sight’ll stir up, but he can’t come up with a good excuse to not go, so he sighs instead and nods.

The ten-minute walk there is spent in silence, Kageyama spending the time trying not to freak out. He hadn’t noticed before, but in the time that they’d been friends all semblance of personal space had been eradicated, translating to Hinata always being excruciatingly close. And it _hurts_ , because Kageyama wants to reach out and touch him, pull him close, and it would take such little effort to, but he doesn’t want to ruin what they have.

They reach Hinata’s house before he knows it, and the sight strangely doesn’t elicit much of a reaction as he’d expected - no quick breathing, sweaty palms, intense blush, nothing. If the memory weren’t burned into the depths of his mind, it was almost as if two weeks ago had never happened.

“You can drop the bags off in the kitchen,” Hinata says, lugging his share with him as he kicks off his shoes in one fluid motion. He’s always had this kind of grace to him, offset by how childish and energetic he often is - movements smooth and efficient, immune to stumbles or mistakes. Kageyama is surprised he isn’t an athlete, and even more surprised that it had taken him _this_ long to realize his feelings for Hinata despite constantly being aware of the other boy long before. “You _do_ know where it is, right?”

“Dumbass, why would I forget after two weeks? I’m not you,” he shoots back, and Hinata’s indignant squawk resounds through the house. Kageyama smiles - he’s been smiling a lot in Hinata’s company, and he can’t really say he minds. (That’s how he knows he’s _really_ whipped.)

“Why do I put up with such a mean person?” Hinata asks himself.

It comes out before Kageyama can stop it. “Because you love me, duh.”

He’s regretting all of his life decisions even before he sees Hinata’s reaction, the smaller boy’s entire body tensing up and the expression on his face shifting from open and content to something darker, scarier, full of secrets. It only lasts for about 2 seconds, though, before Hinata gives him a fake smile and swats half-heartedly at his arm. “Don’t be stupid. Come on, study with me! Exams are coming up.”

This is the first time Hinata has ever willingly studied, but Kageyama doesn’t mention it - can’t, because he’s still too busy wishing he could go back in time and unlive everything - as they climb the stairs. It’s evident the blinds are closed in Hinata’s room because there’s no more blinding sunlight, and the blue of the walls are tinted a slight sepia.

“Sit. I need to go through vocab again,” Hinata says, grabbing the multiple textbooks strewn across his desk as Kageyama takes a seat on his bed. (He tries not to think about the significance of it.) “Adjectives are bullying me.”

“I don’t blame them,” Kageyama mutters under his breath, more out of reflex than anything. Hinata punches him in the arm (it hurts more than he’d ever admit), and sits next to him.

They go through the entire section in the textbook. Halfway through, Hinata stands up and turns on the light, the night having crept up on them silently. It’s surprisingly calming, like this, and Kageyama finds that teaching Hinata actually helps him study, too. It’s comfortable, and Kageyama relaxes and forgets about his feelings for his best friend for the first time in two weeks.

They’re on the last page of the unit, talking about romantic adjectives - of course - when Hinata stops Kageyama mid-quiz and asks, “How do I explain the difference between ‘pretty’ and ‘beautiful’?”

Kageyama stares at him, trying to convey how stupid he thinks he is through one glare. “Pretty and beautiful are the same thing,” he says slowly.

Hinata shakes his head, offended for some reason. “No,” he insists, “pretty and beautiful aren’t the same thing.”

Kageyama scoffs. “Prove it then, dumbass.”

Hinata takes the challenge, of course he does, and crosses his arms over his chest. “Fine. Sunsets are pretty. Flowers are pretty. Natsu is pretty. My mom is super pretty.” He opens his mouth to say something else, but something stops him. Kageyama raises an eyebrow.

When Hinata doesn’t continue after 5 seconds of silence, he gives in and asks. “What’s beautiful, then?”

Hinata turns to him, eyes wide and shining. “You are.”

 _Fuck_.

Hinata is close - very, very close, and Kageyama swears it almost seems like he’s getting closer, leaning in, and he can’t do this, he can’t because it feels like his heart is going to burst and he’s going to drown in his own love for Hinata, Hinata who _just called him beautiful_ . He can’t do this, because he is going to lose his money and despite how he’d planned it out before he _really_ doesn’t want to go back to the way his life was. But if he stays any longer, he knows he’s going to succumb, close the miniscule distance between them, so he stands up for the second time in two weeks and tries not to notice the way Hinata’s face crumbles.

“Wh-what are you doing?” His throat is dry. “We’re supposed to be studying. Don’t say things like that.”

Hinata’s expression shuts down, then, and he laughs humorlessly and looks at his hands. “Yeah.” His voice is soft. “You’re right. Sorry.”

Kageyama feels ridiculous as he sits back down. This _can’t_ be good for him - he can’t go around getting his hopes up just because Hinata was caught in the moment and tried to kiss him. Hinata’s the type to pity-date someone, he’s sure, and he feels like the most pitiful person in the world right now.

Kageyama clears his throat, puts down the English textbook and picks up the closest one without glancing once at the cover. Licks his lips, twice. “So, uh-”

“You should leave,” Hinata says, and Kageyama feels something within him shatter. Hinata looks broken - wide-eyed and stammering, close to tears as he stands up and ushers Kageyama out the door. “You should leave, I don’t- I don’t think you should be here right now.”

Kageyama swallows back the pain and the questions and nods, because the look on Hinata’s face is pleading him not to ask. “I- yeah,” he says, defeated. “I should leave.”

Hinata nods back, but as he gathers up his stuff and walks out the door forgetting to wave goodbye, he can’t quite meet his eyes.

\--

Predictably, they don’t talk after that. At all.

And Kageyama swears he’s not lonely, because why would he be? He’d been alone since birth, and had only known Hinata for, what, six months? Even more alone than now, because Yamaguchi and Kenma and the upperclassmen still say hi to him in the hallways, and he still gets invited sometimes whenever they go out, even though he takes care to stay as far away from Hinata as possible. If the others notice anything - which, judging from the worried looks Daichi and Suga exchange the third time the group has a hang-out and Kageyama and Hinata walk on opposite ends of the group, they probably have - they don’t talk about it, and Kageyama’s grateful for that.

So yeah, he really isn’t lonely. He doesn’t have some gaping hole in him like those poems suggest, a Hinata-shaped void in his heart - he’s not that cheesy. Besides, six months isn’t all that much when you compare it to the grand scheme of things.

So this is how he lives for a month or so - avoiding Hinata, avoiding thinking about that almost-kiss, and forgetting something crucial.

It’s the first day of school back from break when he remembers again, because of course it is.

He’s kicking his shoes off in the front door, admiring the new mat his parents had bought a week ago, when he looks up and realizes that _both_ his parents are home early, which is a rare occurrence. Upon further inspection, he figures out that the looks on their faces cannot spell good news, and something cold and heavy drops in his gut.

“Kageyama…” his father hasn’t sounded so tired in months, voice a tired croak behind the hand that covers his mouth. There are bags underneath his eyes, both their eyes, which Kageyama hadn’t noticed because he was too busy thinking about Hinata Shoyou like an idiot. His parents exchange a glance, and Kageyama is already bracing himself for the moment the floor drops from beneath his feet.

“We’re broke,” his mother says.

_There it goes._

\--

Kageyama hasn’t cried himself to sleep in a while, so he can’t fully pretend all’s well the next morning, to the extent where even Tsukishima shoots him a slightly concerned glare as he passes his desk. He hadn’t brought a lunch - hasn’t eaten for the past 36 hours, probably - in the interest of sleeping through the entire break. It’s in these moments that he’s really grateful for the habits he’d instilled in himself from the get-go. They’re the only reason he hasn’t completely given up.

The memories of last night are fuzzy, a fact he’s thankful of. He remembers pushing past his mother, who’d tried desperately to explain, hold him back, and heading straight to his room, slamming the door behind him so hard the frame had rattled. He remembers falling face-first into his bed, and it’s there in the cold solace of his room that he stays for the rest of the day, screaming until his voice doesn’t work anymore.

Despite how much he wants to, he can’t blame Hinata like he’d done before. Unlike before, he can’t run away from the truth as easily.

The truth is, it’s all his fault.

His fault for loving Hinata. His fault for being so selfish. His fault for getting caught up in something so dumb and irrational like love, for sacrificing his parents’ happiness for a meagre high school romance. His fault, his fault, his fault.

It’s five minutes to the end of break, and he wants to get out.

He knows, objectively, that there’s no logical place he could go, and even if there were he’d be alone with his thoughts, nothing but himself and cold, cold guilt. He knows this, thinks about this even as he’s walking out of the school and out of the grounds, ignoring the few familiar faces that call out to him in concern. Thinks about this even as he collides into a warm mass, and only then does he blink out of his stupor, just in time to catch orange hair stumbling backwards.

A beige sweater, hiding a small frame.

 _Hinata._ Of course. The absolute worst person to run into in this situation, given his current state and their current relationship. He braces himself, and speaks first. “Uh-”

That’s the only thing he manages to get in before Hinata is straightening, looking him straight in the eye with an intensity that automatically removes all his ability to speak. For five long, excruciating seconds, they don’t say anything. Kageyama feels himself slowly crumbling.

Then, quietly, “Wanna get out of here?”

Kageyama’s head snaps up, and he looks at Hinata. Hinata stares back, quiet and calm, and Kageyama is hit by a rush of _love_ so strong it’s almost painful, rendering him breathless. Still, by some miracle, he manages a breathy, “…yeah.”

Hinata nods. “Let’s go.”

\--

“Oi, dumbass,” Kageyama yells into Hinata’s ear, struggling to be heard over the wind, “are you trying to get me killed?”

Hinata just _laughs_ , the bastard, and pedals faster. “For someone who frowns so much, you’re really a weakling, aren’t you?”

“What did you say?!” Kageyama roars.

Before he can attempt to rip off a handful of orange hair, though, Hinata yells “We’re here!” and brakes so suddenly Kageyama falls backwards off the bike. He isn’t offered a hand up, or an “are you okay?” and instead looks up to see Hinata laughing and running away. “Come on, Stupidyama! Don’t let a little scrape like that slow you down!”

“Dumbass, I think I broke my ribs,” Kageyama wheezes, struggling to his feet to scan his surroundings. They’ve stopped at a rusty fence bordering an unfamiliar neighborhood, topped with foreboding barbed wire and littered with DO NOT TRESPASS signs. “Are you sure this is legal?” he calls to Hinata on the other side, staring dubiously at the open door. “Hey,” he asks, more seriously, “are you on drugs or something? Because-”

“ _No_ , Stupidyama, just come look-” and there’s a hand grabbing his wrist through the gap the open door leaves and yanking him through, banging his knee on the edge of the door painfully. Kageyama takes in a deep breath to curse-

Before he sees where they’re standing, and all words fly out of his mouth.

They’re at a beach - the most beautiful place Kageyama’s ever seen, all powder-white sand and crystal-clear water one usually only ever sees in postcards from far-off exotic places. The crescent of sand is only about a mile long, both ends visible, and bordered by downtown skyscrapers on one side and the snow-laden branches of trees on the other. Despite the frigid air and chilly breeze, it’s surprisingly warmer here, the ground snow-free. It almost seems as if he’s entered a separate world, the sketchy gate a wormhole bending the fabric of the cosmos.

Beside him, Hinata laughs, snapping him out of his trance. “It’s beautiful, huh? My parents found this place back when they were dating. Man, you should see the look on your face. If only I had a camera on me right now-”

“Don’t you dare,” Kageyama threatens, and just like that all the previous tension dissipates, all the secrets and silence and _feelings_ melting away and leaving just two friends watching a beautiful view together, as it should be.

Hinata leaps away. “Whoa, scary! Come on, let’s sit.” He plops himself down on the sand and pats the spot next to him, beaming. Kageyama stares back incredulously.

“How do I know I’m not going to freeze my ass off?”

Hinata gasps. “Language, Stupidyama! You’re so crude!”

Kageyama rolls his eyes, and sits. A lifetime passes between them in silence, while Kageyama tries not to think about how close they are, until he finally gives in and asks: “Oi, dumbass. Did you… did you mean it?” He doesn’t understand why he’s so nervous - he doesn’t have problems speaking in front of big crowds or important officials, so why is talking to Hinata, completely alone, making his palms sweat so hard?

Hinata’s face is unreadable for long enough to make Kageyama panic, before he breaks down and starts laughing. It’s a silent kind of laugh, making his body hunch over and his shoulders shake, and Kageyama’s cheeks grow hotter by the second. Finally, when Kageyama is contemplating the merits of running into the water to drown, Hinata looks at him, wiping a tear from his eye, and says, “For someone who’s at the top of the class, you’re really dumb, you know that?”

“Hey, what did you just-” Kageyama barks, launching himself at Hinata, but of course his reflexes come into play and he dodges nonchalantly.

“Well, there’s no point hiding it now,” he says, smiling that wide smile that makes Kageyama’s heart nearly flatline, eyes shining with a certain kind of courage as he looks Kageyama in the eye and says, “I like you.”

Kageyama’s brain short-circuits, and then reboots, and then short-circuits again. Five times.

“Actually,” Hinata continues, unfazed by Kageyama’s choking sounds,  “more than like. I love you, Kageyama Tobio. I thought it was obvious, but I hadn’t counted on you being the most oblivious person in the history of the planet, so…” he leans back on his elbows, eyes tilted towards the sky, turning a soft, deep blue as the sun slowly approaches the horizon. “Man, and Noya-san accused _me_ of being dumb,” he adds, under his breath. “Especially considering him and Asahi-san and all-”

He doesn’t say anything after that, because after five rapid-succession system failures Kageyama’s brain has finally begun working again, and he can think clearly enough through the pounding of his heart to reach through the fog, take Hinata’s face into his hands, and close that little distance between them.

He’d meant for it to be just a little peck, something to convey what he couldn’t trust his words to, but when he moves to pull away Hinata buries a hand in the hair at the back of his head and pulls him back. Despite both their inexperience, it’s slow and soft enough that it’s not as awkward as Kageyama had dreaded, and the feeling of Hinata against him, burning through him in every place they touch, overrides any coherent thought trying to form.

Like this, Hinata’s fingers in his hair, everything else melts away; like this, he forgets about the money and his future and only thinks that maybe, just maybe, he wouldn’t mind trading money for time, if it meant spending an entire lifetime with Hinata by his side. He wouldn’t mind being selfish just this once.

When they finally break apart for air, Hinata grins at him, hair mussed and cheeks flushed, and teases, “So I guess that means you like me back, huh?”

Kageyama, somehow, finds the ability to force sound past his sandpaper throat. “No,” he says, and can’t help but grin when Hinata’s face falls. “I don’t like you.”

Hinata turns away from him, arms limp at his sides, and Kageyama takes the opportunity to slide their fingers together. When Hinata turns to face him, alarm clear on his face, he flicks him gently on the forehead and says, “I love you, too, dumbass.”

Hinata opens his mouth to say something. Closes it. With the addition of how wide his eyes are, he strongly resembles a fish. Kageyama restrains a laugh. “So, are we…” he starts faintly before pausing to clear his throat. “Are we, like, dating or…?”

Kageyama rolls his eyes, trying to hide the feeling of blood rushing to his face so fast he feels a little light-headed, and flicks him again, harder this time. “Who’s the dumbass here, dumbass? Of course we are.”

“Well…” the sand shifts as Hinata stands, brushing off the seat of his pants. “It just… doesn’t feel right, you know? I feel like it’s too easy. There aren’t even roses or gifts involved. Just… _sand_.”

Kageyama rolls his eyes and scoops up a handful of sand, shifting so he’s facing Hinata, on one knee, holding the sand out like an engagement ring. “Hinata Shoyou,” he says solemnly, mockingly, “will you go on a date with me?”

“If you keep making fun of me I’m going to say no,” Hinata threatens, but his grin is bright enough to sear itself into the backs of Kageyama’s eyelids for hours.

\--

The next day, Hinata is outside his classroom, talking to Yamaguchi. He looks up when Kageyama walks out, and smiles wide. Kageyama doesn’t understand what he’s done to deserve this; actually, he just doesn’t understand anything at all.

Hinata says goodbye to Yamaguchi and bounds over to his side, easily slipping their fingers together like they’re meant to be there. _Maybe they are_ , Kageyama dares himself to think, and subsequently melts out of the sheer corniness of everything. “Let’s go!” he says, attempting to drag Kageyama with him, but Kageyama doesn’t move, and Kageyama is taller and stronger and heavier so he ends up just stumbling backwards.

“Where are we going?” He starts them off at a less hyperactive pace; next to him, Hinata makes up for the decline in speed by practically hopping five feet into the air with every step.

“On a date, duh,” he says, as if it’s the most obvious thing in the world. In his mind, Kageyama begins tallying how many times Hinata has made him malfunction in the past ten minutes alone. The numbers are alarming. “That’s what boyfriends do, right?”

Kageyama splutters for a good ten minutes, while Hinata takes the opportunity to walk faster, and by the time Kageyama has formed a coherent thought they’re already nearing the train station.

“I- I need to call my parents,” he says desperately, but Hinata just waves him off.

“Don’t worry about it, I got their blessing,” he says. “Went to your house this morning, after you left for school. Got me late and everything.”

Kageyama swallows down the panic that results from the realization of _oh my god Hinata saw my_ house _, he knows how poor I am, he knows everything_ , and waits for the accusing look, the shock, the _pity_. He knows his house - however Hinata managed to find it, considering he’s never told anyone his address - is half the size of Hinata’s already modest one, that his neighborhood is littered with garbage and right next to a red-light district, that the windows are the bad kind of stained and the front door is falling off its hinges.

He braces himself for the worst, but all he gets is Hinata smiling up at him and saying, “Your parents are cool.”

Kageyama wants to kiss Hinata right then and there. And, well, they can- so he does, of course, and smiles against the squawk of surprise that results.

He’s painfully aware of the stares they’re receiving when they break apart, but the blush on Hinata’s face drowns everything else out. This time, Hinata’s the one spluttering as Kageyama drags him through the big metal doors of the train station, down the escalators and all the way until the fare collectors, where he stops and waits for Hinata to regain his bearings, trying not to smile lest he be arrested for looking suspicious.

Thankfully, it doesn’t take long before Hinata snaps back to attention and starts digging around in his bag, eventually producing two crinkled train tickets. They pass through the fare collectors without a hitch, and Hinata leads them onto the right platform just as the train is screeching to a halt right before them. It’s full, but not packed - the bliss of living in a small prefecture. They find a comfortable place to stand, close enough to barely touch, not looking at each other out of sheer adolescent bashfulness.

The doors close and the train grinds into motion, the passengers swaying in tandem with the rocking. There’s mild chatter everywhere, but it’s quiet for the most part, the vast majority of the people tired after a long day at work or school. After a stop, Kageyama finally remembers to ask, “Hey, dumbass. Where are we even going, anyway?”

Hinata gives him a devious smile. “It’s a secret.”

Unimpressed, he looks up and reads all the stops on the line. “...Karasuno Park?” he guesses, and judging from the sound of despair Hinata makes, he’s right.

“How could you ruin this romantic moment for me?” he whisper-wails, trying not to disrupt the atmosphere. “I wanted to see your look of _surprise!_ You suck, Stupidyama.”

Kageyama rolls his eyes so hard they go into the back of his head. “Dumbass,” he says, and that’s when he feels it.

The rattle of the train, just a little more intense than usual. The lights flicker almost imperceptibly on and off, and more than anything, he can feel the wave of panic beginning to swell in his heart, egged on by the tense murmurs that start to rise in the crowd around him.

“Kageyama,” Hinata is saying, and he looks down to lock gazes with brown eyes, furrowed slightly in worry. “What’s happening?”

“How would I know?” He straightens up, looking above the heads of the other passengers for something, anything. The search, of course, turns up short. _Shit_ , he swears internally, just as feedback erupts from the overhead speakers.

“ _We seem to have run into some problems up ahead,_ ” the announcer’s voice sounds calm, but the inflection of his words is marred slightly by the same fear that’s starting to spread thick and dark over the train. “ _We ask that everybody remain calm and hold on tight._ ”

The train explodes into sound, a roar of noise that makes Kageyama flinch instinctively. _I don’t understand_ , he thinks, not wanting to believe. _I don’t understand. I gave it up already, I gave up the money, I fell in love, so why? Why is my time being cut short?_

And then, _my time’s being cut short_ . Suddenly there’s no doubt in his mind. _I’m going to die here_ , he thinks.

 _No._ We’re _going to die here_.

“Shoyou,” he gasps out, and the wave within him crests, ears ringing and heart burning black with fear. Hina- _Shoyou_ is still looking at him, pleased surprise and panic fighting for domination in his eyes. “Shoyou, I love you.”

He expects something along the lines of _where did that come from, jerk_ or even _why did you call me that, you creep_ , but what he gets is Shoyou pulling him close, hands curling against the fabric of his school uniform. What he gets is orange hair buried in his chest, a muffled voice saying, “I know, jerk. Who’s the dumbass now?”

It startles a laugh out of Kageyama, and the passengers next to him look at him like he’s crazy. He can see others trying to open the doors, thinks, _stupid, you think you have a better chance of surviving if you jump out of a moving bullet train_?

“W- we should call Daichi and the others,” he says, as the train shakes violently and throws some people to the floor, including them. They fall in a heap, landing on shoes and purses, Shoyou on top. “Kenma and Lev, too. In- in case…”

“…you don’t have to sugar-coat it, Stupidyama,” Shoyou says, and they sit up, legs still tangled together, Kageyama hunched over Shoyou like shielding him is going to prevent the inevitable from happening. “We’re not going to make it, are we?”

Speechless, Kageyama shakes his head, and something in Shoyou’s expression crumples for a second before it lightens again in a woeful smile. “And I promised to help Natsu bake cookies, too…” he says, more to himself than anything, and Kageyama feels his insides crumbling.

“I have to do the chores,” he says. “I always do, my parents are too busy. They work really hard, you know? Always. Kind of like you, Shoyou.”

Shoyou beams up at him, and the rest of the world closes because this what he needs the most, orange hair and brown eyes to keep him anchored when he feels like he’s drifting away. “I like it when you say my name,” he says.

Kageyama smiles, and reaches up to ruffle Hinata’s hair, cherishing every super-soft strand that passes through his fingertips because he’ll probably never get to feel it again. “So needy, Stupidyama,” Shoyou chides, just as the train jerks violently again and the lights all shut off one by one, leaving them in complete darkness. All around them, people have begun calling their loved ones, holding each other and crying. In the distance, someone has started screaming. Kageyama pulls Shoyou to him- as if the orange-haired idiot needed the dark too, one more thing to be afraid of right now.

“Tobio,” Shoyou says softly, as Kageyama’s heart drops to the soles of his feet, “I’m okay.”

 _Are you really_ is what he wants to say, but what comes out instead is, “I love you.”

Shoyou laughs, and Kageyama closes his eyes, wishing that when he dies, the last thing he remembers is this sound, filling his mind with light. “You don’t have to keep saying it, stupid. I love you too, okay?”

Kageyama nods, squeezing his eyes so hard static bursts across the darkness. Below them, the ground has started rumbling, and he can feel wind across his face, light shining directly into his eyes.

_Wait a second._

Heart stuttering to a stop, he opens his eyes and looks up to find nothing left of the rest of the train, just blue sky and water sparkling below. They’re on a bridge, he realizes; they’re on a bridge, or rather, what used to be a bridge, because it’s crumbled halfway through and now there’s nothing but air between them and certain death several hundred feet below. Beyond the ringing in his ears, he can hear screams, sobs; beyond the ringing in his ears, he can hear Shoyou asking “what’s up?” in confusion.

He shakes his head, pulling Shoyou closer as the mental clock in his head starts ticking down. _This isn’t fair_ , he wants to scream, but if he opens his mouth he’ll start crying, so he just tries to focus on the ball of orange hair in front of him and not the darkness that lies beyond. _This isn’t fair. I gave it all up already, all my money, my parents’ happiness, at least give me this. Please._

_I was supposed to have more time._

_I was supposed to have more time._

_Hina-_

_Shoyo-_

_Please._

\--

He wakes up feeling like he’s been crying all night.

He stares up at the dappled sunlight across his bedroom ceiling, muffled by curtains. He’s gripping his duvet so hard his knuckles are white, he realizes, and promptly lets go.

It’s his first day of high school.

He breathes, letting conscience return to all corners of his body. His parents are probably still asleep, but there’s leftovers from last night’s takeout; he’ll pack that for lunch and maybe buy some milk if there are any vending machines. The darkness above him reminds him of the chasm between him and his middle school teammates, looking back and watching his toss drop to the floor.

He stands up, works the ache out of his joints. _Maybe I’ll make some friends this year_.

\--

The train ride to school is an easy one, just 20 minutes, but for some reason fear grips him every time the car shakes, and he finds himself thinking about the dangers of such fast transportation. He doesn’t like thinking very much, though, so that stops pretty quickly.

He gets off at the right stop and lets the crowd carry him all the way outside, where they disperse enough that he can stop and get a breath of fresh air.  He has time to waste - worried parents made him leave ten minutes earlier than he’d needed to, and he considers buying a quick snack before he gets to school, maybe a drink he can sneak into class.

He spots a small concession stand close by, and takes a step in that direction when a bike speeds past him, close enough that he jumps back instinctively. He catches a glimpse of orange hair, and for a second the world melts away and his heart leaps sky-high, but then the moment passes just as the biker disappears into the distance.

He blinks, shakes himself off. _Dumbass_ , he reprimands himself. _What are you doing, getting all worked up over nothing_.

Still, as he gets himself a drink and starts the walk to school, he can’t shake off the feeling of _knowing that person_.

\--

The initiation assembly is a bore, as expected, and Kageyama spends the entire time envisioning volleyball plays until the dean finally claps his hands, dismissing the students. Class trickles by at the speed of molasses, slowed down by his anticipation of the end of the day, and when the final bell rings he bolts out of class so fast the desk nearly topples over.

Strangely enough, the spring to the school gym is clouded with images of bright orange hair passing by him at incredible speeds, so much so that at one point he has to stop mid-run and catch his breath over the overwhelming feeling lodged in his throat, that feeling of _I know him. I know him. I know him._ He doesn’t understand - is he sick? Does he have some super-rare brain disease? Is it early onset dementia? He almost gets lost in his thoughts, before the sound of shoes squeaking against a gym floor snaps him back to reality, and he fights back a smile at the anticipation. _So close._

_Three._

_Two._

_One._

Kageyama Tobio walks into Karasuno High School’s gymnasium, and deja vu punches him in the gut.

“Hey! Toss it to me!”

\--

_If you were to have a lot of money or a lot of time, which would you choose?_

**Author's Note:**

> uh... *raises hands in defence* syke...?  
> (No, Ennoshit was not a typo.)  
> (SCREAM ABOUT KAGEYAMA IN THE COMMENTS WITH ME)


End file.
